"Sure I wish I knew all you do, Captain!" But, if the Captain was learned and good-natured, the children taxed his patience, Miss Nellie especially.
She had not lost any time in setting about making that collection of shells which she had mentioned to him in confidence when coming down in the train it was her intention to begin as soon as she got to the sea; and, all the time he had been speaking of the little crabs and other things, she had been busily gathering together all sorts of razor shells, pieces of cuttle-fish bone, cast-off lobsters' claws, and bits of seaweed, which she now proudly drew his attention to, expecting the old sailor's admiration.
He was, on the contrary, however, extremely ungallant.
"All rubbish!" he exclaimed on her asking him if he did not think her pile of curiosities nice.

"But, those corallines, young lady, are good.
They were long supposed to belong to the animal world, like the zoophytes; instead of which they are plants the same as any other seaweed.

When that little branch you have there is dry, if you put the end of it to a lighted candle, it will burn with an intense white flame, similar to the lime-light, or that produced by electricity." "We'll try it to-night!" said Bob emphatically.

"We'll try it to- night!" "But, the Captain says it must be quite dry," interposed his sister, somewhat appeased by the praise bestowed on her corallines for the wholesale condemnation her collection had received.

"Isn't that so, Captain ?" "Right you are, my deary," said he.